Still room for improvement, Otago inspection shows

The latest Otago Regional Council inspection of dairy farms confirms that most in the region are complying with effluent discharge rules, but some farmers still need to upgrade systems and improve effluent and irrigation management.

Council staff visited more than 140 dairy farms and found that 134 fully complied with the rules.

Environment services manager Martin King says while that is slightly below the previous survey result, the level of compliance on the 400 or so dairy farms in Otago is very high.

However, the council says it found at least a dozen cases in the latest inspection round where so-called fail-safe sensor systems on travelling irrigators had failed or were not set up properly.